Studies and analysis of reference management software: A literature review

Reference management software is a well-known tool for scientific research work. Since the 1980s, it has been the subject of reviews and evaluations in library and information science literature. This paper presents a systematic review of published studies that evaluate reference management software with a comparative approach. The objective is to identify the types, models, and evaluation criteria that authors have adopted, in order to determine whether the methods used provide adequate methodological rigor and useful contributions to the field of study

A Robotic Solution for the Restoration of Fresco Paintings

In this paper, a service robot solution is presented for the analysis, surveying and restoration of fresco paintings. The proposed design approach integrates robot design and restoration operation. It aims to merge them into a feasible solution that can be both practical and feasible for restorers. The simulation results are reported to show a successful design solution, which has been conceived with the constraints of a low-cost user-oriented design and the consideration of cultural heritage

Is eco-efficiency in greenhouse gas emissions converging among European Union countries?

Eco-efficiency refers to the ability to produce more goods and services with less impact on the environment and less consumption of natural resources. This issue has become a matter of concern that is receiving increasing attention from politicians, scientists and researchers. Furthermore, greenhouse gases emitted as a result of production processes have a marked impact on the environment and are also the foremost culprit of global warming and climate change. This paper assesses convergence in eco-efficiency in greenhouse gas emissions in the European Union. Eco-efficiency is assessed at both country and greenhouse-gas-specific levels using Data Envelopment Analysis techniques and directional distance functions, as recently proposed by Picazo-Tadeo et al. (Eur J Oper Res, 220:798–809, 2012). Convergence is then evaluated using the Phillips and Sul (Econometrica, 75:1771–1855, 2007) approach that allows testing for the existence of convergence groups. Although the results point to the existence of different convergence clubs depending on the specific pollutant considered, they signal the existence of at least four clear groups of countries. The first two groups are core European Union high-income countries (Benelux, Germany, Italy, Austria, the United Kingdom and Scandinavian countries). A third club is made up of peripheral countries (Spain, Ireland, Portugal and Greece) together with some Eastern countries (Latvia and Slovenia), while the remaining clubs consist of groups containing Eastern European countries

Behavioral Biomarkers for Animal Health: A Case Study Using Animal-Attached Technology on Loggerhead Turtles

Vertebrates are recognized as sentient beings. Consequently, urgent priority is now being given to understanding the needs and maximizing the welfare of animals under human care. The general health of animals is most commonly determined by physiological indices e.g., blood sampling, but may also be assessed by documenting behavior. Physiological health assessments, although powerful, may be stressful for animals, time-consuming and costly, while assessments of behavior can also be time-consuming, subject to bias and suffer from a poorly defined link between behavior and health. However, behavior is recognized as having the potential to code for stress and well-being and could, therefore, be used as an indicator of health, particularly if the process of quantifying behavior could be objective, formalized and streamlined to be time efficient. This study used Daily Diaries (DDs) (motion-sensitive tags containing tri-axial accelerometers and magnetometers), to examine aspects of the behavior of bycaught loggerhead turtles, Caretta caretta in various states of health. Although sample size limited statistical analysis, significant behavioral differences (in terms of activity level and turn rate) were found between “healthy” turtles and those with external injuries to the flippers and carapace. Furthermore, data visualization (spherical plots) clearly showed atypical orientation behavior in individuals suffering gas emboli and intestinal gas, without complex data analysis. Consequently, we propose that the use of motion-sensitive tags could aid diagnosis and inform follow-up treatment, thus facilitating the rehabilitation process. This is particularly relevant given the numerous rehabilitation programs for bycatch sea turtles in operation. In time, tag-derived behavioral biomarkers, TDBBs for health could be established for other species with more complex behavioral repertoires such as cetaceans and pinnipeds which also require rehabilitation and release. Furthermore, motion-sensitive data from animals under human care and wild conspecifics could be compared in order to define a set of objective behavioral states (including activity levels) for numerous species housed in zoos and aquaria and/or wild species to help maximize their welfare

Origin of congenital coronary arterio-ventricular fistulae from anomalous epicardial and myocardial development.

Coronary Artery Fistulae (CAFs) are cardiac congenital anomalies consisting of an abnormal communication of a coronary artery with either a cardiac chamber or another cardiac vessel. In humans, these congenital anomalies can lead to complications such as myocardial hypertrophy, endocarditis, heart dilatation, and failure. Unfortunately, despite their clinical relevance, the aetiology of CAFs remains unknown. In this work, we have used two different species (mouse and avian embryos) to experimentally model CAFs morphogenesis. Both conditional Itga4 (alpha 4 integrin) epicardial deletion in mice and cryocauterisation of chick embryonic hearts disrupted epicardial development and ventricular wall growth, two essential events in coronary embryogenesis. Our results suggest that myocardial discontinuities in the embryonic ventricular wall promote the early contact of the endocardium with epicardial-derived coronary progenitors at the cardiac surface, leading to ventricular endocardial extrusion, precocious differentiation of coronary smooth muscle cells, and the formation of pouch-like aberrant coronary-like structures in direct connection with the ventricular lumen. The structure of these CAF-like anomalies was compared with histopathological data from a human CAF. Our results provide relevant information for the early diagnosis of these congenital anomalies and the molecular mechanisms that regulate their embryogenesis.The authors thank Dr. A. Rojas (CABIMER, Sevilla, Spain) and Prof. Thalia Papayannopoulou (University of Washington, WA, USA) for sharing with us the G2- Gata4-Cre and Itga4-floxed mouse lines, respectively. We also thank Vanessa Benhamo (Institut Imagine) for her expert support with HREM. Finally, we thank all members of “DeCA” laboratory (University of Málaga, Málaga, Spain), and the “Heart Morphogenesis” laboratory (Institut Imagine and Institut Pasteur, Paris, France) for their help and fruitful discussions on this paper. This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, R+D+i National Programme [grants RTI2018-095410-RBI00 and PID2021-122626-OB-I00], Spanish Ministry of Science-ISCIII [grant number RD16/0011/0030], and University of Málaga [grant number UMA18-FEDERJA-146] to [JMPP]; Consejería de Salud y Familias, Junta de Andalucía [grant number PIER-0084- 2019] to [JAGD]; University of Málaga [grant number I Plan Propio-UMA-A.4] to [ARV]; Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities (MCIU) (CIBER CV) [grant numbers PID2019-104776RB-I00 and CB16/11/00399] to [JLDLP].S

The dynamic use of EGFR mutation analysis in cell-free DNA as a follow-up biomarker during different treatment lines in non-small-cell lung cancer patients

Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutational testing in advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is usually performed in tumor tissue, although cfDNA (cell-free DNA) could be an alternative. We evaluated EGFR mutations in cfDNA as a complementary tool in patients, who had already known EGFR mutations in tumor tissue and were treated with either EGFR-tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) or chemotherapy. We obtained plasma samples from 21 advanced NSCLC patients with known EGFR tumor mutations, before and during therapy with EGFR-TKIs and/or chemotherapy. cfDNA was isolated and EGFR mutations were analyzed with the multiple targeted cobas EGFR Mutation Test v2. EGFR mutations were detected at baseline in cfDNA from 57% of patients. The semiquantitative index (SQI) significantly decreased from the baseline (median = 11, IQR = 9 5-13) to the best response (median = 0, IQR = 0-0, p < 0 01), followed by a significant increase at progression (median = 11, IQR = 11-15, p < 0 01) in patients treated with either EGFR-TKIs or chemotherapy. The SQI obtained with the cobas EGFR Mutation Test v2 did not correlate with the concentration in copies/mL determined by droplet digital PCR. Resistance mutation p.T790M was observed at progression in patients with either type of treatment. In conclusion, cfDNA multiple targeted EGFR mutation analysis is useful for treatment monitoring in tissue of EGFR-positive NSCLC patients independently of the drug received

Advanced trajectory generator for two carts with RGB-D sensor on circular rail

This paper presents a motorised circular rail that generates the motion of two carts with an RGB-D sensor each. The objective of both carts' trajectory generation is to track a person's physical rehabilitation exercises from two points of view and his/her emotional state from one of these viewpoints. The person is moving freely his/her position and posture within the circle drawn by the motorised rail. More specifically, this paper describes the calculation of trajectories for safe motion of the two carts on the motorised circular rail in detail. Lastly, a study case is offered to show the performance of the described control algorithms for trajectory generation.- This work was partially supported by Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovacion y Universidades, Agencia Estatal de Investigacion (AEI) / European Regional Development Fund (FEDER, UE) under DPI2016-80894-R grant

Canvass: a crowd-sourced, natural-product screening library for exploring biological space

NCATS thanks Dingyin Tao for assistance with compound characterization. This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Institutes of Health (NIH). R.B.A. acknowledges support from NSF (CHE-1665145) and NIH (GM126221). M.K.B. acknowledges support from NIH (5R01GM110131). N.Z.B. thanks support from NIGMS, NIH (R01GM114061). J.K.C. acknowledges support from NSF (CHE-1665331). J.C. acknowledges support from the Fogarty International Center, NIH (TW009872). P.A.C. acknowledges support from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), NIH (R01 CA158275), and the NIH/National Institute of Aging (P01 AG012411). N.K.G. acknowledges support from NSF (CHE-1464898). B.C.G. thanks the support of NSF (RUI: 213569), the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation, and the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation. C.C.H. thanks the start-up funds from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography for support. J.N.J. acknowledges support from NIH (GM 063557, GM 084333). A.D.K. thanks the support from NCI, NIH (P01CA125066). D.G.I.K. acknowledges support from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (1 R01 AT008088) and the Fogarty International Center, NIH (U01 TW00313), and gratefully acknowledges courtesies extended by the Government of Madagascar (Ministere des Eaux et Forets). O.K. thanks NIH (R01GM071779) for financial support. T.J.M. acknowledges support from NIH (GM116952). S.M. acknowledges support from NIH (DA045884-01, DA046487-01, AA026949-01), the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs through the Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program (W81XWH-17-1-0256), and NCI, NIH, through a Cancer Center Support Grant (P30 CA008748). K.N.M. thanks the California Department of Food and Agriculture Pierce's Disease and Glassy Winged Sharpshooter Board for support. B.T.M. thanks Michael Mullowney for his contribution in the isolation, elucidation, and submission of the compounds in this work. P.N. acknowledges support from NIH (R01 GM111476). L.E.O. acknowledges support from NIH (R01-HL25854, R01-GM30859, R0-1-NS-12389). L.E.B., J.K.S., and J.A.P. thank the NIH (R35 GM-118173, R24 GM-111625) for research support. F.R. thanks the American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities (ALSAC) for financial support. I.S. thanks the University of Oklahoma Startup funds for support. J.T.S. acknowledges support from ACS PRF (53767-ND1) and NSF (CHE-1414298), and thanks Drs. Kellan N. Lamb and Michael J. Di Maso for their synthetic contribution. B.S. acknowledges support from NIH (CA78747, CA106150, GM114353, GM115575). W.S. acknowledges support from NIGMS, NIH (R15GM116032, P30 GM103450), and thanks the University of Arkansas for startup funds and the Arkansas Biosciences Institute (ABI) for seed money. C.R.J.S. acknowledges support from NIH (R01GM121656). D.S.T. thanks the support of NIH (T32 CA062948-Gudas) and PhRMA Foundation to A.L.V., NIH (P41 GM076267) to D.S.T., and CCSG NIH (P30 CA008748) to C.B. Thompson. R.E.T. acknowledges support from NIGMS, NIH (GM129465). R.J.T. thanks the American Cancer Society (RSG-12-253-01-CDD) and NSF (CHE1361173) for support. D.A.V. thanks the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation, the National Science Foundation (CHE-0353662, CHE-1005253, and CHE-1725142), the Beckman Foundation, the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, the John Stauffer Charitable Trust, and the Christian Scholars Foundation for support. J.W. acknowledges support from the American Cancer Society through the Research Scholar Grant (RSG-13-011-01-CDD). W.M.W.acknowledges support from NIGMS, NIH (GM119426), and NSF (CHE1755698). A.Z. acknowledges support from NSF (CHE-1463819). (Intramural Research Program of the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Institutes of Health (NIH); CHE-1665145 - NSF; CHE-1665331 - NSF; CHE-1464898 - NSF; RUI: 213569 - NSF; CHE-1414298 - NSF; CHE1361173 - NSF; CHE1755698 - NSF; CHE-1463819 - NSF; GM126221 - NIH; 5R01GM110131 - NIH; GM 063557 - NIH; GM 084333 - NIH; R01GM071779 - NIH; GM116952 - NIH; DA045884-01 - NIH; DA046487-01 - NIH; AA026949-01 - NIH; R01 GM111476 - NIH; R01-HL25854 - NIH; R01-GM30859 - NIH; R0-1-NS-12389 - NIH; R35 GM-118173 - NIH; R24 GM-111625 - NIH; CA78747 - NIH; CA106150 - NIH; GM114353 - NIH; GM115575 - NIH; R01GM121656 - NIH; T32 CA062948-Gudas - NIH; P41 GM076267 - NIH; R01GM114061 - NIGMS, NIH; R15GM116032 - NIGMS, NIH; P30 GM103450 - NIGMS, NIH; GM129465 - NIGMS, NIH; GM119426 - NIGMS, NIH; TW009872 - Fogarty International Center, NIH; U01 TW00313 - Fogarty International Center, NIH; R01 CA158275 - National Cancer Institute (NCI), NIH; P01 AG012411 - NIH/National Institute of Aging; Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation; Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; P01CA125066 - NCI, NIH; 1 R01 AT008088 - National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health; W81XWH-17-1-0256 - Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs through the Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program; P30 CA008748 - NCI, NIH, through a Cancer Center Support Grant; California Department of Food and Agriculture Pierce's Disease and Glassy Winged Sharpshooter Board; American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities (ALSAC); University of Oklahoma Startup funds; 53767-ND1 - ACS PRF; PhRMA Foundation; P30 CA008748 - CCSG NIH; RSG-12-253-01-CDD - American Cancer Society; RSG-13-011-01-CDD - American Cancer Society; CHE-0353662 - National Science Foundation; CHE-1005253 - National Science Foundation; CHE-1725142 - National Science Foundation; Beckman Foundation; Sherman Fairchild Foundation; John Stauffer Charitable Trust; Christian Scholars Foundation)Published versionSupporting documentatio